Permanent Reminder of a Temporary Feeling
by Stacy
Summary: Amanda and Francine celebrate their success in wrapping up a case with a night out on the town…but they wake up with more than just a hangover!


Permanent Reminder of a Temporary Feeling  
  
Summary: Amanda and Francine celebrate their success in wrapping up a case with a night out on the town...but they wake up with more than just a hangover!  
  
Author's Notes: The title is inspired by Jimmy Buffett's "Permanent Reminder of a Temporary Feeling". The song is about a man and a woman who marry in Vegas while completely bombed out of their minds. This story isn't about a marriage, but...well, let's call it another example of a permanent reminder of a temporary feeling. Takes place during the 4th season - before Nightcrawler.  
  
  
  
Amanda had a hangover. She had never had one before, but this was the way it was described in her romance novels when the hero went on a drinking binge. Same throbbing headache, sensitivity to the light, a hollow feeling in her stomach. Her back ached. Amanda rolled over in her bed and looked at the alarm clock. It was well past 10AM. She closed her eyes and lifted her hand to massage her temples. Mother, Philip and Jamie would be home in time for dinner. They had gone camping for the weekend with the neighbors.  
  
Amanda allowed herself a few more minutes to wake up. She needed to brush her teeth and take a shower. This was the very reason why she never drank more than a glass of wine with dinner. Now, at age 35, she had her first hangover. 'But still, we did have a fun time last night...I wonder how Francine is doing?'   
  
**  
  
Francine awoke much the same way Amanda had. She blindly reached out to close the curtains that let in the late morning sun. 'Oh, god,' she thought as she sat up in bed. "What the heck did we drink last night?" she said out loud. It seemed like a good idea at the time. They had just wrapped up a case together. Lee was in Singapore, and Billy had temporarily assigned Amanda and Francine to work together. The All-Woman's Gym was the perfect place for the secretary of the Surgeon General to be passing classified information. Francine had to admit, she and Amanda worked well together. Francine frowned a bit at the pain in her left shoulder. "I need a shower," she yawned. The petite blond stood and stripped off her clothes as she headed to the bathroom. The closer she got to the tub, the more seductive the hot water seemed. She couldn't wait to climb in and luxuriate in the coarsing water.  
  
As Francine passed the full length mirror, she paused to look at herself. She had a few bruises from yesterday's bust now showing their angry colors. She didn't remember getting hit on the shoulder, though. She turned to view the shoulder in the mirror. Francine's face dropped. "Oh, my god!" she yelled. She looked closer in the mirror. "Oh...no," she gasped, pure denial lacing her voice. She quickly ran into the living room and scooped up her address book.  
  
  
  
**  
  
Amanda had just made her own discovery when she heard the phone ring. She was inspecting her lower back in the mirror. "Oh, my gosh...oh my gosh!" She ran down the stairs to answer the phone, thinking it might be Lee needing a pickup from the airport. He was due back from Singapore sometime over the weekend.  
  
"Hello?" Amanda said into the phone.  
  
"I have a tattoo!" Francine screamed into the phone.  
  
Amanda winced. "I do, too" she admitted. She thought hard...when did they decide to get tattoos?  
  
"Does yours say 'I love Leatherneck'?" Francine demanded.  
  
"No...I got a Scarecrow," Amanda said sheepishly. "Francine...I don't remember getting a tattoo."  
  
"Oh, Amanda...neither do I. I do remember we started out a Monks and then went to Nedlinger's," Francine trailed off.  
  
"Somebody bought me an Alabama Slamma" Amanda continued. "Then you ran into an old friend and he bought us another round."  
  
Francine nodded into the phone. "And then that drunk girl came in and accused me of trying to hit on her boyfriend,"  
  
Amanda laughed. "She tried to hit you, and you had her face down on the bar in two seconds!"  
  
Francine laughed. "Yeah, I was pretty good, wasn't I? After that, those college boys came in. One of them had just turned 21."  
  
"Jesse," Amanda supplied the name. "He and his friends bought us another round."  
  
Francine interrupted. "That's right...one of them was an art major and he said we were a comparison in contrast...the blue-eyed blond and the brown eyed brunette."  
  
"Yeah...and he pulled out an artpad and sketched us!" Amanda cut in. "He said he wanted to immortalize our faces..."  
  
"...and you suggested he turn the drawing into a tattoo." Francine finished.  
  
Amanda's face flamed red. "So that means...there is a college student out there who has our faces tattooed on his body somewhere?"  
  
Francine couldn't help it. She burst out loud laughing. "And somewhere along the lines, we told them about the men in our lives...that's how I wound up with this Leatherneck tattoo."  
  
"And I have a Scarecrow...gosh, Francine...this isn't funny. What on earth would Leatherneck and Lee think if they ever saw these?"  
  
Francine was silent. "I don't want to know what they'd think. We'll just keep it to ourselves, right?"  
  
  
Three months later...  
  
"Amanda, what's that on your shirt?" Lee asked. He walked over to his partner and pointed to the back of her shirt.   
  
"What?" Amanda turned her hip so she could see the area Lee was talking about. "I don't see anything." She looked closer at the thin white fabric of her shirt. She could see the outline of her tattoo through the material. Lee thought it was a stain.  
  
"No, right here," Lee reached out to touch the material. Amanda quickly turned and sat in her chair.  
  
"It's nothing," she said quickly.  
  
Lee's curiosity was piqued. "Amanda, you are a terrible liar. You promised that you would stop lying to your family, remember?" he asked. He leaned down to look into her eyes. "We are going to be married, so that makes me family, therefore, you cannot lie to me."  
  
"That is very underhanded," Amanda smiled. "Okay, okay...do you remember when you went to Singapore a few months ago?"  
  
"Yes," Lee answered carefully.  
  
"Well, while you were gone, Francine and I were assigned a case together and we solved it pretty fast. Well, we decided to go out to celebrate our success that night, so we went to Monk's and then we went to Nedlinger's. We had a few drinks and then Francine put this woman in an armlock, because the woman thought Francine was hitting on her boyfriend, which she wasn't. So later, a few college kids came in, and one of them had just turned 21, so they bought us a round and somehow we wound up at a tattoo parlor and Francine and I got tattoos." Amanda finished on one breath.  
  
This was not the outcome he had been expecting. "You got a tattoo?" he asked. "You, Amanda King...you got a tattoo?" he asked. A grin spread across his face  
  
"Well, I like to call it a permanent reminder of a temporary feeling." Amanda smiled. "I haven't had a drop to drink since then."  
  
"So what is it?" Lee asked, he reached down to pull up her shirt.  
  
Amanda pushed him back with a finger to his chest. "Now, Lee...you'll have to wait until our Wedding Night to discover that little secret." She smiled.  
  
The end.  
  



End file.
